Health systems across Europe are confronting significant challenges. Ageing populations, a rising burden of chronic disease, and a more challenging fiscal context following the economic crisis, are focusing attention on the financial sustainability of health systems. There is a pressing need for solutions and tools that can improve quality of care and ensure better value for money.

Health outcomes measurement is just such a tool. Health outcomes are the health benefits (and in some cases, the disbenefits) that result from health-related interventions. They include: survival and mortality; readmissions; adverse events; functional status; pain; and ability to carry out normal daily activities. This paper focuses on one of the principal ways in which health outcomes data can be used to improve quality of care and enhance value for money: the analysis of variation.

The Value of Health: Improving Outcomes is a multi-stakeholder initiative advocating for more outcomes focused health systems in Europe. The Value of Health consensus document was launched at the European Parliament in March 2016. This paper has been produced by a thematic Value of Health working group on health outcomes variation. Nikos Dedes, a member of the Board of Directors of the EATG, is a co-author of the paper.

Twitter

The online platform MINUS VIRUS is established by the Eastern European and Central Asian Union of people living with HIV as part of the regional project “Partnership for equitable access to HIV care continuum in EECA” with the financial support of the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria (GF).